Saturday, September 17, 2016

Agatha Christie – Royal Mail First Day Cover

The newest collection of the
Royal Mail First Day Cover is dedicated to Agatha Christie, having six stamps
from six of her works (Murder of the Orient Express, The Mysterious Affair at
Styles, The Body in the Library, And Then There Were None, The Murder of Roger
Ackroyd and A Murder is Announced).

On 15 September 1890, in the
seaside of Torquay in Devon, Frederick and Clara Miller had a baby girl whom
they named Agatha Mary Clarissa. Growing up at Ashfield with her brother Monty
and sister Madge, and educated at home, the young Agatha lived in a comfortable
middle-class environment where reading was a priority.

In 1912, 22 year-old Agatha met
Archibald Christie. The couple had a somewhat turbulent courtship but would
ultimately marry on 24 December 1914. During the First World War, while her
husband served in the Royal Flying Corps, Agatha enrolled as a Voluntary Aid
Detachment nurse in a Red Cross Hospital in Torquay. In 1915, she began working
at a hospital dispensary and it was there that she would acquire a very useful
working knowledge of poisons. Drawing upon her new experiences, in 1916 she
wrote her first detective story, The Mysterious
Affair at Styles, basing the nationality of her detective, Hercule Poirot,
on that of the Belgian refugees who had arrived in Torquay. When the finished
article was submitted to a British publisher, however, it was rejected. Four
years later, it was finally published in the USA and in the UK in January 1921.

Almost two and a half years after
the birth of Agatha’s daughter Rosalind, the Christies set off on a 10-month
Grand Tour in January 1922, during which they visited South Africa, Australia,
New Zealand, Hawaii and Canada. Agatha’s next book, The Secret Adversary, was published at the same time, followed by The Murder on the Links (1923), Poirot Investigates (1924), The Man in the Brown Suit (1924), and The Secret of Chimneys (1925).

The summer of 1926 saw the end of
Agatha’s first marriage and the publication of her sixth detective novel, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, notable for
its innovative sleight of hand.

Early in 1930, Agatha met a young
archaeologist, Max Mallowan, on an impromptu trip to Iraq and later that year
they were married in Edinburgh. The year 1930 also saw the first appearance of
a new solver of crimes, Miss Marple, whose sharp detecting skills were revealed
in The Murder at the Vicarage.

In the 10 years following her
second wedding, Agatha published more than 20 books, including her two most
famous works, Murder on the Orient
Express (1934) and And Then There
Were None (1939). The next decade saw her established as a major
playwright. The Mousetrap opened in
London’s West End in November 1952 and has been running ever since.

After writing 66 detective
novels, six romance novels, 150 short stories, 19 plays, two poetry collections
and two memoirs, 85-year-old Agatha Christie died on 12 January 1976 at her
home in Wallingford, Oxfordshire, the undisputed queen of crime.

About Me

I have studied Theology at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, School of Theology, International Relations at the University of London (Queen Mary). My Master's Thesis was published as a book: 'The Aegean Sea Dispute Between Greece and Turkey - The Consequences for NATO and the EU'. For more information see: http://www.akakia.net/el/the-aegean-sea-dispute-between-greece-and-turkey
I have also studied Byzantine Music in Athens and I am currently undertaking a research on the “Fellowship of St. Alban and St. Sergius and its contribution towards Anglican – Orthodox Relations”, at the University of Winchester.
I also represent the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of Thyateira and Great Britain at the A.E.C.A. If you wish to contact me you can email me: demetrifs1@yahoo.com